Thanks to Jacky, I have been on the lookout for information on or about or by EDWARD ODELL. In the diaries and letters everyone merely mentioned him as “Mr Odell” or just plain “Odell”. I hadn’t even had a first name! Mary even wrote of him as Mr Odall!

But thanks to Jacky’s incredible letter, from Catherine Odell to Maria Smith – concerning Mrs Odell’s son EDWARD – I figured I had found not only the first name of the elusive Mr Odell, but also a “family” for him. It all fit: Drummond’s constant remarks about Ireland (Catherine’s letter was headed “YOUGHAL”); the family conferences after Odell returned from Sicily — but Drummond did not; the pleading of Mrs Odell for Maria to consider her son Edward as a suitor. And the seeming silence (though note: this letter was retained!).

So I was searching and searching for information on some Edward Odell in the Youghal region. Little did I at first realize the one (and only) Edward Odell I stumbled upon was THE MAN: Edward Odell of Carriglea, near Dungarvan, Ireland.

Because Drummond was a Cambridgeman, I kept trying to locate Odell in the Alumni Cantabrigienses. Drummond himself, once I read through some of his letters (first transcribed about two years ago; all beginning in the 1820s and going on into the early 1830s; they end before his fateful trip to Italy with Mr Odell), made me realize the obvious: Odell may have been at Harrow with Drummond, but he was now at OXFORD! Of course he was quite easily located in the Alumni Oxonienses.

But I located this citation only after this extraordinary “find”: A Publication with a letter written by Odell and containing news about the death of “a friend of mine named Smith”. My Drummond!!

Read for yourself [my comments, as I typed the letter from a snippet view of the book, are included in green; I have paragraphed it, to make it easier to read online]:

Carriglea [that name!], Dungarvan, Ireland

Feb. 21, 1833

Dear Giles

I was much annoyed to find by your letter which I received two days since that I have been so long in your debt, and regret that you did not sooner write to inform me of it. But it can hardly be said to have been my own fault as I will explain to you. The very day on which you left Oxford I called at your room to discharge my debt and was informed by the porter that you had been gone I believe only an hour. As I then intended to have resided the next term I thought no more of it, but the Fates had decreed otherwise, and long before the term began I was on my way to Italy.

Previous to my departure however I left a sum of money with Lord Ossory with a memorandum of how he was to dispose of it, which done I discharged my mind of the whole business. In September of the following year when at Venice I received a letter from him saying that he had lost the list which I gave him, but that he believed he had paid all that I desired him and had lodged the remainder at my banker’s. In this opinion I very naturally coincided, when after a length of time I heard nothing to the contrary. This I hope will convince you that I was not to blame, and before long it will be in my power to make all straight between us.

I say before long because I have returned from my wanderings like the prodigal son, and could not raise as many pence till my next quarter becomes due. I am sorry that you have left Oxford as I have some intention of keeping my Master’s term in the summer, that is to say if I am well enough, for at present I am in rather a seedy state.

I had been ill last spring in London & like a fool set off to travel before I had recovered my strength, in consequence of which I eventually became again so unwell that independent of other causes the object of my leaving England would have been disappointed. [IS this Drummond?:] Lord Ossory and a friend of mine named Smith[!] whom Toogood remembers at Harrow were with me – the former intending to return to England at the end of the year, but Smith and I were going to Egypt [no, can’t be Drummond…] and Asia Minor and from there into Persia.” We accordingly proceeded through Germany, down Italy and to Sicily which was all beaten ground to me.

Till then I had got on tolerably well but the knocking about in the latter country and sleeping in the open air floored me completely. We were three weeks at one spell without entering a house & living in a tent. [my God! I swear this IS Drummond] Our design was after leaving that to have gone to Malta and sailed from thence to Egypt. But everything went wrong.

Bad as I was I was better than Smith who [gotta be HIM!] seemed quite unequal to standing the vicissitudes of climate and weather. At last he got a fever against which he had not strength to bear up & at the end of eleven days he breathed his last. This as you may imagine was a complete extinction to any further pleasure, and at once determined me on returning with Lord Ossory to England. In fact being now without a companion and in the wretched state of health in which I myself was it would have been preposterous had I persisted in my design of going to the East. We therefore made our way back to Italy and from thence home as fast as we could, and here I have now been for a month nursing myself. I have by no means abandoned my intention of visiting the countries which I have mentioned, but I shall wait till the beginning of next year [! it’s a letter SIGNED by Edward Odell!!!!!!]. Perhaps before that something may take you to Oxford and that we may meet. Pray remember me to Toogood who I hope is flourishing, and believe me dear Giles

your’s very truly

Edward Odell

OH–MY–GOSH!

What’s so “shocking” about this letter, other than the fact that it’s the first time I’ve seen ANYTHING from Odell himself describing this trip? As mentioned, Drummond’s letter book (lent to Rob Petre for photographing by Prof. Jeremy Catto; I am grateful to them both) is that it ends with the very letters where Drummond pleads with Mamma Smith to be allowed to accompany Odell on this trip (me thinks Mamma was NEVER very pleased; I know she grudgingly gave consent…); yet there are NO letters — and Drummond would have sent a steady stream of correspondence home! — during the trip abroad. (A loss; for I had hoped they spanned up to the time of his death.)

What Odell reveals here is the shocker: “Our design was after leaving [Sicily] to have gone to Malta and sailed from thence to Egypt” and “Smith and I were going to Egypt and Asia Minor and from there into Persia.” EGYPT! ASIA MINOR! PERSIA!?

Mamma Smith didn’t want to consent to Drummond’s travelling to Italy — and yet the pair contemplated Egypt, Asia Minor, and Persia?! So my question: Did Mamma know? If Drummond had lived, would he one day have sent a letter dated “Egypt,” stating his intention of remaining by Odell’s side through this fantastically far-flung trip?

There was precedent: Mamma herself, in July 1822, left the younger children home: Spencer, Drummond, Charlotte and Maria. Emma wrote Aunt about their decision to remain in ROME during the winter of 1822/23, and advised Aunt “Mamma wishes you not to tell this to the poor children unless you think that by very gentle degrees, & hints, it would be advisable to let them know”…

Would Mamma have been “hoisted by her own petard”? We’ll never know; Drummond died November 5, 1832, in Sicily.